Chelsea FC boss Jose Mourinho was this morning crowned Premier League Manager of the Year. Eden Hazard also picks up the Player of the Year (more on which you can read here) as the award winners are leaked early.
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The West London club’s Portuguese manager held off competition from the likes of Garry Monk and Ronald Koeman to bring home the award, his third such achievement. Having been awarded the honour after his first two Premier League triumphs, Mourinho now moves alongside Arsene Wenger in 2nd place in the all-time winners’ list although they are some way off Sir Alex Ferguson’s record tally of 11.
The most intriguing bit of this news is that Mourinho has not won a single Manager of the Month award this season, and yet has been handed the overall prize. Mind you, it’s hard to disagree with the decision.
Having returned to Chelsea in the summer of 2013, Mourinho immediately played down his chances of bringing silverware to Stamford Bridge that season. In a marked contrast with his infamous ‘special one’ speech in 2004, Jose was much more reserved telling the press that it would take a season to form a trophy-wining squad.
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He wasn’t wrong.
Th 2013/14 season was spent building a cohesive squad (and getting Eden Hazard to track back) paving the way for the Premier League-League Cup double achieved this time round. Furthermore, despite the supposed boring football that the Blues have had to resort to in the latter half of the season, Chelsea have dominated the league. A win on Sunday at home to Sunderland would bring their points total to 87 while their winning margin could be as wide as 11 points.
Regarding Mourinho’s competition, meanwhile, there may be a few tacticians feeling a bit hard done by. Southampton’s Koeman, for instance, has done a sterling job down on England’s southern coast. The former Holland international (and two time European Cup winner) came to St Mary’s at the start of the season to find a previously impressive Saints squad that had seemingly sold away its core.
Five of Southampton’s starting line-up left the team in the summer (Shaw, Chambers, Lovren, Lambert, Lallana) as Saints brass recognised their positon as a selling club. Having said that, they didn’t half make money from the transactions. It is thought that the five highly sought after talents raked in close to £100 million. Nonetheless, the Saints went from potential top 6 contenders to potential releagation candidates.
Through a mixture of shrewd investment (Ryan Bertrand, Fraser Forster), application and team management, the Saints head into the weekend with a very real chance of nabbing 6th, or even 5th, position and entering the Europa League next season. Manger of the Year worthy? Some journalists certainly think so.
Swansea City boss Garry Monk was also in the running. The former Swans club-captain took over from Michael Laudrup midway through last season and in his first full campaign in charge has already attained a record number of points for the Welsh side. They are also assured of their highest ever Premier League finish in 8th place.
cake without icing is just sponge. And that’s all just a bit terrible
However, if you ask Chelsea fans, there was only really ever going to be one winner. The Blues boss, though, has played down the personal achievement. Speaking to Sky Sports, he said: ‘It is, as you like to say in England, the icing on the cake, but the cake is more important than the icing.
‘The cake is the Premier League, the cake is the objective of the manager, of the technical staff, of the squad, of the club, of the millions of supporters, and I work for the cake, I don’t work for this.
‘If, at the top of the cake, I am the manager of the season, obviously I am very happy with that.’
I like to say that any cake without icing is just sponge. And that’s all just a bit terrible isn’t it? So, congratulations Jose, and hopefully I’ll be writing the same thing come May 2016.
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